Lukacs: Flyers could be fleeced

Gabor Lukacs at Halifax Stanfield International Airport in 2013. The Halifax mathematician has launched a Federal Court of Appeal challenge against the Canadian Transportation Agency. (CHRISTIAN LAFORCE/Staff)

A legal loophole could leave travellers flying from Europe to Canada without any protection if they are booted from their flight, argues one passenger activist.

Halifax mathematician Gabor Lukacs has launched a Federal Court of Appeal challenge against the Canadian Transportation Agency.

Lukacs wants the agency to force airlines to compensate passengers who are booted from overbooked flights between Europe and Canada. It is one of four active court challenges Lukacs has against the agency.

Back in May, the agency ruled that British Airways passengers who cannot board a plane because their flight is overbooked must be compensated. The agency applied the same tariffs that Air Canada pays, which is up to $800 for delays over four hours.

But this only applied to flights from Canada to the European Union. Flights from the European Union to Canada were exempted from the ruling altogether.

“I honestly don’t know what they were thinking,” said Lukacs. “This is an absurd decision. This decision makes absolutely no sense.”

On Monday, he appealed the authority’s decision in the Federal Court of Appeal.

In court documents, Lukacs argues the agency has created “a legal loophole that undermines the ability of passengers bumped from British Airways flights … to commence an action for denied boarding compensation.”

Before the ruling, Lukacs tried to present arguments about Europe-to-Canada flights, but it was deemed to be outside the scope of the issue.

Because of this, Lukacs also argues in court documents that the process was unfair.

Analyst David Tyerman of Canaccord Genuity Corp. said he suspects the agency may have been worried about jurisdictional issues. The European Union has its own rules around flight compensation, and since the delay happens overseas, Tyerman said it may be out of Canada’s control.

“Basically you’re extending your rules into another country for an event that occurs in another country,” he said.

“I don’t know. Jurisdictionally, this could be a very messy thing.”

The Canadian Transportation Agency has not yet filed a response to Lukacs’s filing. The agency said Tuesday evening it could not comment on the case because it is before the courts. But in past decisions, the agency has said it does not have the authority to enforce fines in Europe.

Lukacs formerly taught at Dalhousie University and says he works on several international mathematical research projects but is not associated with any university.

He has won several cases involving passenger compensation in the past, although he is more used to fighting airlines than the regulator itself.

After one Lukacs complaint, the agency ruled last month that Porter Airlines must pay passengers bumped from domestic flights.

In February, the agency, also acting on a complaint by Lukacs, ruled Porter must compensate bumped passengers travelling from Canada to the United States.

He also sparked the 2013 decision that Air Canada must pay $200 to $800 to passengers bumped from domestic flights, depending on the length of the delay.